The first time Peter Mandelson resigned, I was Treasurer of a beleaguered Conservative Party that needed all the cheering up it could get.
It was December 1998 and Tony Blair's government, elected with a huge majority the previous year, had lost a key figure.
The Tories congratulated themselves on achieving a 'scalp' (in reality, it had little or nothing to do with their indignant demands to know who knew what and when about the bizarre circumstances of Mandy's whopping secret loan from a fellow minister) and eagerly looked forward to the collapse of the New Labour project.
This duly followed – a mere decade later. Mandelson's third departure this month came days after that of Angela Rayner as Deputy Prime Minister and was swiftly followed by the defenestration of a senior No 10 aide.
All this after the homelessness minister resigned after evicting her tenants and hiking the rent, an anti-corruption minister went over a corruption row, and the Transport Secretary left when it was revealed she had a conviction for fraud.
